William Horberg

Pulp Collection

Original paintings made for the covers of pulp magazines from the 1930's were treated as disposable commercial art-for-hire in their time, and therefore are quite rare today.

One of the masters of the medium was Norman Saunders, so it was quite a treat to stumble upon a small exhibit of the original vintage paintings of some of his now famous work at an out-of-the-way gallery run by Syracuse University on a recent trip to New York.

One of Saunders many employers was Hugo Gernsback, the editor of Amazing Stories, Wonder Stories, Science-Wonder Stories and many of the other seminal pulp fiction publications that introduced writers like Jules Verne and H.G. Wells to the world. In fact, he is often known as the Father of Science Fiction, and the annual award for the best in science fiction writing, The Hugo, is named after him. I had never seen a picture of him at work, but they had a cool one in the exhibit.

Although not painted by Saunders, I liked this poster from one of the most successful pulp characters, spawning radio shows, comics, movies, and books for generations:

Norman Saunders knew what evil lurked in the hearts of men, and women, and he painted them luridly, and beautifully.

Enjoy!

william

Ten Best Films

"Tis the season for retrospective analysis of the year that was and the resulting onslaught of lists, or lisztomania to paraphrase the film of British director Ken Russell, one of the many 20th Century film icons who died this year.

My TEN BEST list this year is retro - ten films that I had wanted to see for years and finally caught up with, or some fresh suggestions of classics from film friends that really inspired me.

All highly recommended. In no particular order.

1. KES

            

Ken Loach's second film after his start in British television and the one that brought him international acclaim is a masterpiece of realism featuring an unforgettable performance by young David Bradley and his kestrel, whose soaring flights over the soot-scarred landscape of his troubled youth are pure poetry.

2. THE WORLD

           

Thanks to Dave Kehr for turning me on to this Chinese film from director Jia Zhangke, with its fascinating modern blend of realism, theatricality and animation. Set in a loopy Beijing theme park with Vegas-style recreations of scaled down versions of famous world landmarks that might have been designed by the villian Gru from "Despicable Me", the opening shot alone is worth the price of admission.

3. GET OUT YOUR HANDKERCHIEFS

           

How did I miss this one? An iconic French comedy by Bertrand Blier from the '70's that helped catapult its star Gerard Depardieu to worldwide fame, the somewhat far-fetched and very French premise of a young husband enlisting a lover to cheer up his depressed and tres beautiful wife, wonderfully played by Carole Laure, has three or four unforgettable scenes including the tour-de-force opening ten or twelve minute sequence in which the premise is set-up so convincingly - a triumph of writing, acting and direction.

4. HOUSE

          

I blogged about this late '70's film from Japanese producer/director Nobuhiko Obayashi previously but it merits another mention here as a celebration of extreme no-limits-to-the-imagination filmmaking. Pure pop!

5. SHADOWS

           

It was great fun this year in preparing for the filming of "Disconnect" to revisit the early independent work of writer/director/actor/producer John Cassavettes and rewatch Husbands and Faces, and to finally get a chance to watch his very first and perhaps best film "Shadows". The closest film equivalent to a great improvised jazz solo, this black and white portrait of a group of interracial relationships in Beat era New York City stars Leila Goldoni and a memorable turn from Tony Ray, whose father Nick Ray was also one of the most interesting filmmakers of the era.

6. BLOODY SUNDAY

           

This film caused a stir among agents and executives in Hollywood when it first came around in 2002 and catapulted its director Paul Greengrass to big studio level filmmaking, but I was out of the country and missed it, and it has been surprisingly hard to get on DVD since then for some reason - it certainly deserves to be more widely seen; perhaps a Criterion treatment should be in the offing. In the vein of The Battle of Algiers, it is a documentary-style portrait of one man caught in the maelstrom of a devastating act of political violence, with an incredible performance by James Nesbitt that must be seen.

7. DAVID HOLZMAN'S DIARY

           

From people of the generation that preceded mine I had always heard that this cult film holds a place of reverence, and seen today it is a pioneering analog work that anticipates so much of what has become the lingua franca of the digital age - DIY, confessional self-reflection, unreliable narrative, meta-fiction. "Exit To The Gift Shop" certainly owes a debt of gratitude to this film. Having known the director Jim McBride for decades I am embarrassed to admit that I only caught up with it on its video re-release this year; but I'm happy to include it on this list of rediscovered gems.

8. THIS SPORTING LIFE

          

I was happy to find this still frame from the movie online, as apart from the more famous iconic image of the bloodied and muddied working class rugby player played by Richard Harris in this amazing, harrowing film by Lindsay Andersen; this was one of the scenes that really broke my heart - the tender interlude he has with the children of widower Rachel Roberts.  A sharp contrast to the film's brutal depiction of life and love as violent sport and a bucolic memory to cling to amidst the many hard truths of David Storey's novel and screenplay. Sometimes the emperor has no clothes, and sometimes a masterpiece is a masterpiece for a reason - glad I waited as long as I did to encounter this one.

9. BORN TO WIN

          

One of the pleasures of having a streaming Netflix subscription and an iPad. I stumbled on this great Ivan Passer film accidentally one night on location and couldn't stop watching it - not because of the small supporting role played by Robert DeNiro who is shamefully featured on the DVD cover - but because it was such a captivating portrait of a time and place (the mean streets of Manhattan circa 1970) with such winning performances (George Segal, Karen Black, Paula Prentiss) and an unforgettable turn by Jay Fletcher as Segal's drug-hustling buddy Billy Dynamite. It has a mixed reputation, but I think it is one of those films that has gotten better with age.

10. MURDERBALL

           

I liked this film so much that I hired its co-director Henry-Alex Rubin to direct "Disconnect". A documentary with a real grasp of narrative storytelling and just the right tone in a story that could have been too sentimental or full of bathos. The "star" of "Murderball", Mark Zupan, pictured here, even came out and graced us with a cameo in our movie. Watch for him!

What cinematic discoveries or rediscoveries did you make this year?

Enjoy!

william

Cinema of the Mind

You know when you crack open a book and in one sentence are caught up in the spell of an author's voice and grip and eagerly relax as you know you are going to gladly be transported to wherever the storyteller confidently chooses to take you?

"Dr. Rankin was a lage and rawboned man on whom the newest suit at once appeared outdated, like a suit in a photograph of twenty years ago. This was due to the squareness and flatness of his torso, which might have been put together by a manufacturer of packing cases. His face also had a wooden and a roughly constructed look; his hair was wiglike and resentful of the comb. He had those huge and clumsy hands which can be an asset to a doctor in a small upstate town where people still retain a rural relish for paradox, thinking that the more apelike the paw, the more precise it can be in the delicate business of a tonsillectomy."

                                        - De Mortuis

"A rural relish for paradox" - wonderful!

Thanks to Peter Lang for introducing me to the delightful worlds and imagination of John Collier. As a fan of the fantastic and a wanderer amongst the wonderful, I have no idea how this writer and his work stayed off of my radar screen for lo these many years. What were those English teachers at the Latin School of Chicago and Wesleyan University thinking to not include a writer like Collier in their cirriculum?

Thanks to the New York Review of Books publishing imprint for collecting these fanciful stories and bringing them back in print for the 21st century - with a fan's appreciation of an introduction by Ray Bradbury no less!

Apparantly one of Collier's epic but never realized achievements was his screenplay adaptation of Milton's "Paradise Lost" - which he dubbed Cinema of the Mind. It would take more than a "rural relish for paradox" to think that we are currently living in an Age of "cinema of the mind" (many other body parts would more quickly spring to mind), but imagine if some brave filmmaker and adventurous studio would boldly take up Collier's mantle today!

Who would your choice be to play Adam? Eve? Moloch? Satan? Beelzebub?

Enjoy!

william

The Location Scout

No matter where you are in the world, every film location scout has a certain rhythm and shape and tropes familiar to anyone in the business. The beautiful island of Guadeloupe was no exception.

Here is a little photoblog of some iconic moments from our preliminary look-see for your enjoyment.

The driver is usually one of the most important local members of the team, and often the coolest dude. We were blessed with a father and son team, Max and Patrice, whom we dubbed Mad Max and Danica Patrick for their mad skills behind the wheel. You never knew which one was going to show up each day. 

On any scout you will almost invariably find someone pointing a finger. Usually it is the director, but it can also be the location manager, or in this case the local guide to the city.

More often than not, when you see the most beautiful location and fall in love with it, you will be told that it has poor access, no place for a base camp, is too steep, or otherwise massively unfriendly to production.

This can lead to another trope - the look of consternation exchanged between bottom-line oriented producer and artistic-minded filmmaker.

It can be an amazing and wonderful thing when people generously open their homes and share their interior worlds and lives with you. Taking the time to hear their stories invariably enriches your own understanding of the world, and seeps into the DNA of your film project. This woman was a cook, and one of the greatest organizers to maximize the use of a small space that I have ever witnessed.

This woman had come to Guadeloupe from Algeria, and lived in an old 1930's wooden beach house that was as weathered and experienced at survival as she was; only when her daughter arrived did we discover it was also her birthday!

Snack food is an inevitable part of driving around in a car all day. There has been a movement over the years away from loading up on donuts and other junk and towards providing the team with some healthier options.

This cassava or manioc had a thick texture with some kind of brown sweet syrup inside made from local sugar cane. Not bad.

Why is it that Directors always feel that they have to have some kind of special chair to sit in?

The Film Gods are always prone to laughing at our futile efforts to impose our organizational will on nature, so it is not a bad idea to light a candle and say a prayer wherever you go. As they say, the quickest way to end a drought is to take out your film camera and set up for a shot!

If you see a location you like during the day, it is usually a good idea to go back and take a look at night, too. Or if you visit a place in the winter and it has a great view, try to imagine what it will look like when you come back to shoot six months later, when it has been completely blocked by foliage, or even worse, torn down and paved over by new construction.

Finally, make sure to ask your local guide to suggest the best place for dinner, and take your team out for a delicious last supper!

At the Kote Sud, the house special ravioli stuffed with conch was delicious.

But the local aged Rhum Vieux was to die for!

Enjoy!

william

 

 

 

 

Le Moule

If the island of Guadeloupe is a butterfly, Le Moule is in the middle of the curve of it's right wing.

A very colorful place in the blazing flat light of the noonday day sun, so I decided to shoot it in black and white.

Enjoy

William

Life In A Box - Vernacular Letters

I found an old box full of letters, bills and correspondence of various sorts at a flea market a few years ago. It has been gathering dust in the garage, but I've always been curious to open it and dive in to read and analyze the various clues to a life or lives lived that are contained therein. 

As readers of my blog know, I'm a fan of vernacular photographs, the artifacts of the quotidian every day life of regular people, and this Box seems like equivalent territory - vernacular letters - with words and stamps and postmarks and stationary replacing pictures.

I've thought about the morality of publishing other people's personal letters on a blog, and so I have decided to leave out last names and specific addresses wherever they occur. But at first glance the documents appear to be at least 50 or more years old, and they were for sale at a flea market, so it does not seem anyone cared much about keeping them private.

I hope you'll enjoy going on this treasure hunt with me here. I have no idea what we will find. But I think every life tells a story of some kind. I hope this one proves interesting, and has something to enlighten us about the way we lived then, if nothing else.

The first thing I pulled out of the box is this letter from March 29, 1955. It appears to be from a schoolgirl to her Aunt and Uncle, certainly from one of the Northern states as she makes reference to a recent cold spell of -26º below zero.

Brrr!

29-3-55

Dear Nanie and Dantie,

     How have things been around there? Have you been feeling alright lately. Did Susan mention the epidemic of measles that is going on around the school. Today I got my report card, on it I made all a’s except for 3 b’s compared with the last report card I am doing pretty good. I would like very much to have that horse statue you talked about, I haven’t given up collectioning them yet. Susan is fine, so are Mother and Daddy. Have you heard about our new Oldsmobile convertible, mother’s new palm tree and our new record player we got tonight? How is the weather up there? Down here it dropped to -26 degrees, when it did my very best girl friend Linda spent the night. This week-end our troup Girl Scout troop is going to ga camp Arnold. Did anyone mention Lois C----- is going to have a baby, you know Lois our next door neighbor. Last but not least, Daddy, Mother, Susan & I would love to come and visit you, the way we have planned it is Mother, Susan & I will drive up, then in about a week or two Daddy will come up on the train, then he will stay about a couple of days then we will go to Chyann Wyoming. Hope we can make it. I want to see you and Dantie so much.

                                                                    With much love, Chloe

I love her cursive longhand writing. Feels like a lost art today. I wonder what kind of new record player they purchased in March of 1955, and what songs they were listening to? And where her collection of horse statues may have ended up over time?

Let me know your own impressions. And if you're as curious as I am to see what else comes out of The Box?

Enjoy!

william

Corgi !

Corgi Toys also produced die-cast metal cars and trucks and was started in 1956 as a direct competitor to Dinky. Their factory was in Wales and the company was named after the local breed of dog found in their logo.

Diego and I were excited to find that Corgi also branched out into producing toy rocket ships, as the beautiful drawings in this French sales catalogue for their 1969 toy line evidenced.

They even had a mobile radar system and truck-based launchers. Jeez. Feels like a toy set for a young Saddam Hussein!

To top off the coolness of the Corgi brand line of space vehicles, they even made their own Hovercraft! Be pretty sweet (and a pretty penny) to track down and own one of those today!

Like Dinky, Corgi was ultimately the victim of the changing taste in toys for kids and was bought out by Mattel. But unlike Dinky, the brand was later sold and sold again and now is back operating and selling die-cast metal toys under the Corgi name.

The race for space produced a whole generation of great toys and it is fun to share these old images with Captain Diego, and with you!

Enjoy!

william

Dinky !

Why is this boy smiling?

Once upon a time the Meccano company of Liverpool, England ruled the world market for toy die-cast metal cars. "Dinky" was the name of their line of miniature vehicles, and their colorful small replica models of real cars were the apple of every child's eye.

I found this mint condition French catalogue of Dinky Toy cars from 1969 and loved the graphics and colors and wanted to share it with you here.

Corgi Toy cars became a competitor to Dinky in the 1950's, and eventually both Corgi and Dinky were bought out and subsumed into the Mattel Toy Company whose "Hot Wheels" cars came to dominate the global market. The "Speedwheels" feature on these Dinky cars was introduced to try to compete with Hot Wheels more play-friendly spinning wheel action, but it was too little too late.

Rare Dinky models are valuable collector's items today. I love that boxy Renault, but Diego has the best taste and picked out that cool mid-60's French MATRA as his favorite! 

When it comes to wonderful Dinky toy cars, this boy is smiling and Diego is smiling too!

Enjoy!

william

Inventing Halloween

Thanks to spookshows.com for their wonderful collection of vintage halloween memorabilia and photographs, including these patent applications for various Jack O'Lantern toy designs.

Fun to see that back in 1902 ingenious minds were already at work tinkering and inventing, and the commercialization and commodification of our culture and our holidays that would come to define our 20th Century was starting.

The candle design of Mr. A.B. Herd may have given way to a battery-operated version by R.R. Authier in the 1960's but the incandescent spirit of what started as the Celtic festival of Samhain and later became All Hallow's Eve, really can't be patented.

Happy Halloween to all.

Enjoy!

william

One (False) Step

On August 24, 2010 I took one small step that changed my life.

While scouting locations in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia our group went to visit the local National Theatre which had been suggested as a venue for possible filming and to meet local acting talent.

When we went into the dimly lit interior I photographed the theatre from the back of the room. I then proceeded down the aisle to walk the few steps up to the large black stage at the front of the room to take a photo of the reverse view of the hall from on stage.

But as I took that last step, I suddenly found myself in free fall and plummeted almost twenty feet straight down. The stage had been lowered to the basement level but its absence was totally indiscernible to myself and any of the other members of my group who were befuddled by my sudden disappearance - I appeared to them to have disappeared through the floor of the main stage - like a Houdini trick.

They heard the thud of my impact and my howl of anguish and rushed over to the lip of the stage to see me lying on the ground below. I really can't remember much of what happened next. Later they told me the only way they could get to me was to raise the floor back up to their level, which must have taken some time as it felt like I was down there alone forever. It was a real "touching the void" time for me, as the pain I could feel was magnified by the fear of what I could only imagine had happened to my body.

The next thing I heard was our production designer Dan Dorrance yelling at someone NOT to move my body without putting me on a wooden board to stabilize me. Thank you, Dan! You were my first angel.

Then I remember an ambulance ride from hell. For some reason I was sure that I was sliding backwards out of my stretcher on the bumpy ride through crowded Kuala Lumpur traffic. Dan and our local driver Tiak were in the ambulance with me, and they held me down tight with their strong arms. Thank you, Tiak, you are my second angel.

Arriving at the hospital and taking x-rays and cat scans and getting the diagnosis of the multiple fracture to my crushed heel and the damage to my pelvic area are all pretty much a blur as I write this post, but what I can recall are the other friends in my group, David Willis and John Thompson and Jamie King who stayed by my side and gave me their strength and love and support while I moved through the process of admittance and surgery and the beginning of my recovery. You guys are the best team anybody could ever hope for when the chips are down.

I am writing this 4 days post-op and each day is a new miracle for me. The first 48 hours really tested my will in ways I have never experienced, as every little basic thing we take for granted and that constitute the ground floor of being alive - moving, breathing, eating, drinking, passing, sleeping, dreaming, seemed slightly beyond my ability. 

Jamie King gave up her own trip back and her obligations at work and with her own family to stay here with me through this really hard time. I will always be grateful to you, Jamie. You are the best!

Yesterday morning I was able to eat my breakfast for the first time, I got out of bed for the first time, and with the help of the wonderfully caring staff here at the hospital I took a shower in the wheelchair. 

The water rushing over my body gave me a feeling of euphoria I cannot describe. I was here. I was alive. I could feel again. I was alive.

Tomorrow we will have a Skype account set up so I can see and talk to Elsa and Diego and Natalie and Miro and be connected to those amazing people I am so lucky to have in my life. And Elsa's brother will arrive to take the baton from Jamie and be my best friend over here through the incredibly hard work of re-hab.

I'm working hard first of all to quiet my mind. The only road ahead for me is the next hour, the next meal, the next step forward in my walker. None of us know anything about the future - each moment of our lives contains within it one small step. Who can imagine where that step will take us? 

As I couldn't see the deep chasm that lay ahead of me last Tuesday, nor could I see the rainbow of WONDERFUL loving connections I have made in the days since then. So really there was nothing false or true about that step - it is just what happened then, and all this is what is happening now.

Thank you to everyone who has followed my blog and Elsa's and written in with your encouragement. Your words are a balm.

Peace.

william